38th AIAA/ASME/SAE/ASEE Joint Propulsion Conference & Exhibit AIAA 2002-3874
7-10 July 2002, Indianapolis, Indiana
“Kerosene” Fuels for Aerospace Propulsion – Composition and Properties
Tim Edwards*
Air Force Research Laboratory, Propulsion Directorate
Wright-Patterson AFB, OH
ABSTRACT
This paper describes the composition and selected
properties of kerosene fuels for aerospace propulsion.
These petroleum distillate fuels are composed of
hundreds-to-thousands of hydrocarbons, with the
variations in composition controlled by specifications
on boiling range, vapor pressure, contaminants, freeze
point, etc. The specific fuels to be discussed include
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military jet fuels JP-5,7,8 and T-6, commercial jet fuels
Jet A, Jet A-1 and TS-1, and kerosene rocket
propellants RP-1 and RG-1. Chemical class
composition will be discussed, as well as pertinent
physical properties. Sources of physical property data
and modeling approaches will also be discussed.
INTRODUCTION
The discussion of kerosene fuels divides fairly
naturally into two applications: turbine engines and
liquid rockets. The term kerosene is used to describe a
distillate fraction of petroleum boiling between
(roughly) 150-300 C (300-570 F). An illustration of the
resulting distribution of the hydrocarbons in various
fuels is shown in Figure 1.
Turbine Engine Fuels
The early pioneers in gas turbine development,
Whittle in England and Von Ohain in Germany, faced a
wide variety of options in choosing a fuel for gas
turbines. Whittle had considered diesel fuel, but ended
up choosing kerosene because of an expected
requirement for a lower freeze point than that available
with diesel [Martel, 1987]. In contrast, Von Ohain
originally decided to use hydrogen, but combustor
developmental difficulties led to a switch to liquid fuel
[Dukek et al, 1969]. The world’s first turbojet-powered
flight was made on August 27, 1939 in a Heinkel 178
aircraft burning aviation gasoline. The first flight of the
Whittle engine occurred on May 15, 1941 in a Gloster
Meteor aircraft using kerosene as the fuel. Despite their
head start in turbojet engine development, Germany did
not decide until 1943 to produce jet-powered aircraft.
________________________
*Associate Fellow, AIAA
1
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
This material is declared a work of the U.S. Government and is not subject to copyright protection in the United States.
One of the arguments for development at that time was
Germany's shortage of high octane fuel and the
expectation that the jet engine could run on diesel fuel
[Dukek et al, 1969].
Most of the jet engines developed before the
end of World War II utilized conventional kerosene as a
fuel. As engines and specifications developed, it
became apparent that several fuel properties were key
to bounding the envelope of jet fuel characteristics.
High altitude operation (with ambient temperatures on
the order of -65 F) meant fuel freeze point required
attention. However, the lower the freeze point the
lower the fraction of crude oil that was suitable, so
freeze point had to be balanced against availability.
Atomization and altitude relight were aided by higher
fuel volatility (vapor pressure), which had to be traded
against boiloff and entrainment losses from fuel tanks at
altitude (as well as safety concerns from explosive
mixtures in tank vapor spaces) [Maurice et al, 2001a].
Two fuels emerged in the late 40’s and early 50’s from
this chaotic situation: a “wide-cut” gasoline/kerosene
mixture called JP-4 in the U.S. (MIL-F-5624 in 1950)
and a kerosene fuel with a -50 C (-58 F) freeze point
specified as DERD-2494 in England and Jet A-1 in the
U.S. ASTM D-1655 specification. This freeze point
was arrived at through a significant research effort.
ASTM D-1655 also specified Jet A with a -40 C (-40 F)
freeze point. Civil aviation currently uses Jet A-1 (or
its equivalent) throughout the world, except for
domestic carriers in the U.S., who use Jet A. Military
aircraft used JP-4 until converting to JP-8 in the 1980s.
JP-8 (MIL-T-83133) is essentially Jet A-1 with a three
military-specified additives-fuel system icing inhibitor,
corrosion inhibitor/lubricity improver, and static
dissipater. The conversion to JP-8 occurred primarily
to improve the safety of aircraft, although the “single
fuel for the battlefield” concept (and the similarity of jet
fuel to diesel fuel) is centered on the use of aviation
kerosene in all Air Force and Army aircraft and ground
vehicles. The history of the evolution of conventional,
widely available jet fuels from the late 1950s to the
present is mainly the story of the evolution of test
methods and fuel additives to maintain the integrity of
the jet fuel supply and to improve safety and correct
operational problems.
 Specialty fuels were developed for various
applications throughout the second half of the 20th
century. JP-5 (included in MIL-F-5624) is a high-flash
(140 F) kerosene used on-board U.S. Navy ships to
enhance safety. The development of higher Mach
aircraft led to several specialty fuels. As flight velocity
increases, aerodynamic heating leads to larger amounts
of heat being rejected to the fuel, both in the tanks and
in the engine, leading to vapor pressure and thermal
stability concerns. The cutoff point between the use of
conventional Jet A-1/JP-8 fuels and specially-produced
fuels is between Mach 2.2 and 3. Thus, the Mach 2.2
Concorde uses Jet A-1, while the Mach 3 XB-70 and
SR-71 used specialty fuels. JP-6 (MIL-F-25656) was a
low-volatility kerosene developed for the Mach 2+ XB-
70 [Freschl and Steele, 1965]. The Mach 3 SR-71
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required JP-7 (MIL-T-38219), a low-volatility/high-
thermal-stability, highly-processed (low sulfur and
aromatics) kerosene [Martel, 1987]. The U-2 high-
altitude reconnaissance aircraft required both improved
thermal stability and lower freeze point in its fuel (JP-
TS, MIL-T-25524) because of its high altitude, long
duration cruise. These specialty fuels gave higher
performance than conventional aviation kerosenes, at
the expense of higher fuel and logistical costs (JP-7 and
JP-TS are roughly 3X the cost of JP-8/Jet A-1). The
temperature limits of these various fuels are
approximately 325 F for Jet A/Jet A-1/JP-8, 425 F for
JP-TS, and 550 F for JP-7 [Croswell and Biddle, 1992].
Just for completeness, it should be noted that JP-9 and
JP-10 are high density missile fuels, not kerosene fuels,
and consist of one (JP-10) and three (JP-9)
hydrocarbons. Typical kerosene fuel properties are
shown in Table 1.
Russian jet fuels underwent a parallel
evolution throughout this period [Ragozin, 1961;
Pustyrev, 1993]. In most properties, current Russian
fuels TS-1 and RT and Russian specifications (GOST
10227) are interchangeable with Jet A-1/JP-8. The
main difference between fuels TS-1 and RT is in the
area of thermal stability: TS-1 is a straight run fuel,
while RT is hydrotreated. By comparison with Jet A-
1/JP-8, TS-1 and RT are “lighter” (have a lower initial
boiling point and 10% recovery point in distillation)
and have a correspondingly lower flash point and freeze
point. For example, recent unpublished surveys of
Russian jet fuel at Moscow airport have shown an
average flash point of 97 F (vs 127 F for Jet A-1 shown
in Table 1). Pustyrev discusses two specialty Russian
fuels specified in GOST 12308: T-8V, a higher
density/higher flash kerosene and T-6, a high density
kerosene (specific gravity 0.84 vs 0.8 for Jet A-1/JP-8)
which has no commercial or military counterpart in
Europe or the U.S. [Pustyrev, 1993]. U. S. Air Force
programs in the 1980s demonstrated the production of
fuels similar to T-6 [Hanson, 1989; Smits, 1986], but no
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American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
specification was published in the absence of user
requirements.
Beyond Mach 5, flight speeds are considered
hypersonic (vs supersonic). The high heat loads
encountered by vehicles in hypersonic flight leads
inevitably to regenerative cooling of (at least) the
combustor. The heat loads and fuel flows are such that
high levels of fuel heat sink are required. This heat sink
can be obtained from sensible heating of high heat
capacity fuels such as liquid hydrogen or the use of
endothermic (hydrocarbon) fuels. For many
applications, hydrocarbon fuels are preferred due to
their greater density [Lewis and Gupta, 1997] and ease
of handling. Endothermic fuels achieve heat sink by
deliberate reactions of the bulk fuel, such as
dehydrogenation or cracking [Maurice et al, 2001b;
Lander and Nixon, 1971; Sobel and Spadaccini, 1997;
Ianovski, 1993]. Engine concepts for hypersonic
aircraft are currently under development in several
programs.
World-wide jet fuel consumption was 177
million gallons/day in 1997, with about 40% of the
consumption in the United States [Bacha, 2000].
Kerosene Rocket Propellants
Oxygen/hydrogen is the highest performing
operational propellant family. Of course, the low
temperatures (20 K) and explosion hazards of hydrogen
impose significant launch cost penalties. The low
density of liquid hydrogen (4 lb/ft3) is also a drawback.
For these reasons, Russian launch vehicles and many
U.S. vehicles have used various types of liquid
hydrocarbons as a fuel. Although Goddard’s initial
1926 flight test used gasoline, operational hydrocarbon-
fueled rockets since then have used kerosene. Jet fuels,
as described earlier, are kerosenes; naturally, jet fuels
like JP-4 were the initial kerosenes used in rocket tests
(although JP-4 does not strictly fit the definition of a
kerosene because of its low initial boiling point).
However, it was found that jet fuel did not have tight
enough specification properties to serve as an effective
propellant. The U.S. developed Rocket Propellant 1
(RP-1) in the mid 1950s as MIL-P-25576. In
comparison to jet fuel, RP-1 has a much narrower
allowable density range, and lower limits on fuel
components that were thought to cause deposits during
regenerative cooling, such as sulfur, olefins, and
aromatics [Sutton, 1992]. Deposit formation (“coking”)
led to a maximum fuel-wetted surface temperature limit
quoted as 600 F [Cook and Quentmeyer, 1980], 600-
700 F [Wagner and Shoji, 1975], 580 F [Rosenberg and
Gage, 1991], 710 F [Liang et al, 1998], and 850 F [Van
Huff, 1972]. The amount of coking is very dependent
upon the fuel-wetted surface, with copper causing more
deposition than steel. Russian kerosene (“RG-1”,
 “naphthyl”) is somewhat different from RP-1, notably
with a higher density (0.832 vs 0.806 at 22 C) [Mehta et
al, 1995]. RG-1 has been chilled before use to increase
its density (and thus the mass of propellant that can be
loaded onto the rocket). Engine applications include
the RD-180, RD-170, and NK-33. Aircraft fuel T-6 has
been used in engine tests in place of RG-1 because of
its similar physical properties and greater availability.
Typical kerosene propellant properties are shown in
Table 2.

60
Avgas
RP-1
50 JP-7
Jet A
diesel
40
Weight %

30
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20

10

0
4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20

Carbon number

Figure 1. Carbon number distribution for several kerosene fuels [Edwards, 2001], diesel [Briker
et al, 2001] and avgas [Bacha et al, 2000].

Table 1. Typical aviation fuel properties [Coordinating Research Council, 1983; Martel,
1988; Martel, 1978; ; Goodger and Vere, 1985; Sobel and Spadaccini, 1997; Yu and Eser, 1995;
Mehta et al, 1995; Defense Energy Supply Center, 1997; Wood et al, 1989; Hanson, 1989;
Favorskii and Kurziner, 1990]

Property JP-4 JP-5 JP-7 JP-8 (Jet A/ T-6

Jet A-1)
Approx. Formula* C8.5H17 C12H22 C12H25 C11H21 C16H33
H/C ratio 2.00 1.92 2.07 1.91 1.91
Boiling Range, F 140-460 360-495 370-480 330-510 350-600
Freeze point, F -80 -57 -47 -60 JP-8/Jet A- -77
1; -50 Jet A
Flash point, F -10 147 140 178 127
Net heating value, 18,700 18,500 18,875 18560 18,550
BTU/lb
Specific gravity ,60 F 0.76 0.81 0.79 0.81 0.84
Critical T, F 620 750 750 770
Critical P, psia 450 290 305 340
*For illustration of average carbon number—not designed to give accurate H/C ratios

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American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
 Table 2. Typical kerosene propellant properties [Mehta et al, 1995]

Property RP-1 RG-1

Approx. Formula* C12H23.4 C12H23.4
H/C ratio 1.952 1.946
Boiling Range, F 350-525 380-525
Freeze point, F -56 -52
Flash point, F 155 160
Net heating value, BTU/lb 18,650 18560
Specific gravity ,70 F 0.806 0.832
Critical T, F 770
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Critical P, psia 315

COMPOSITION overall results are shown in Table 4. Examples of the

The composition of kerosene fuels is not fixed
through specifications. Rather, fuel specifications
bound the “envelope” of acceptable compositions.
How, then, can the semi-infinitely-variable composition
of kerosene fuels be described? Often, the fuels are
divided into representative chemical classes. In any
case, one simplification that is usually introduced is to
approximate the fuel by its average. An example of the
variations in JP-8 as given by the Defense Energy
Supply Center’s PQIS database is shown in Figure 2
[Defense Energy Supply Center, 1997/98/99]. Figure 3
shows that the property distributions are not necessarily
“regular”. Some representative class analyses for
aviation kerosenes are shown in Table 3 [Hodgson et al,
1976/1979; Duvall et al, 1985]. In an effort to further
distinguish these classes, several analyses of fuels were
performed using GC-FIMS [Briker et al, 2001]. The
detailed results are shown in Table 5 and 6. Although
the aromatic fraction seems to be over-estimated, these
data are useful in that the normal- and iso-paraffins are
distinguished, and the cycloparaffins (naphthenes) and
aromatics are separated by ring size. These analyses
and other data were used to generate Table 7, which
shows representative average compositions for various
kerosene fuels. The JP-7 compositional data is notably
scattered, with three analyses giving: 32%
naphthenes/65% paraffins [Sobel and Spadaccini,
1997], 56.2% paraffins/41.9 % naphthenes
[unpublished 1991 AFRL analysis of a 1984 JP-7], and
37.9% paraffins/59.8% naphthenes [GC-FIMS in Table
2 above]. The RP-1 and RG-1 GC-FIMS composition
in Table 2 is closer to published results: RP-1=39%
paraffins/58% naphthenes and RG-1=24%
paraffins/75% naphthenes [Mehta et al, 1995].

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American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
 400
90-96 (18.2±3.1 vol%)

Millions of gallons
99 (17.7 ±3.1 vol %)
350
JP-8
300

250

200

150

100
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50

0
9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23 25
Aromatics, vol%

Figure 2. Variation in aromatics content of JP-8.

250

200
Frequency

150

100

50

0
-58 -56 -54 -52 -50 -48 -46 -44 -42 -40

Freeze Point (°C)

Figure 3. Distribution of jet fuel freeze points in U.S airport survey [Davidson, 2001].

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American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
 Table 3: Hydrocarbon classification ASTM D2784
Jet A-1 JP-8 JP-8 JP-5 Jet A
Paraffins 38.3 44.0 46.3 50.7 49.4 (avg
C # = 12)
Cycloparaffins 41.6 36.2 39.5 20.9 34.2 (12)
Alkyl benzenes 12.6 16.5 7.5 17.7 12.7 (10.7)
Indans/tetralins 4.4 2.3 3.9 9.3 2.1 (11)
Indenes/dihydrona 0.9 0 0.5 (10)
phthalenes
Naphthalenes 3.0 0.5 1.9 1.1 0.7 (11.5)
Average carbon 10.6
number
Reference AFWAL- unk AFAPL- AFAPL- AFAPL-
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TR-85- TR-79- TR-76-26 TR-76-26

2049 2016

Table 4. Preliminary compositional analysis of kerosene fuels from GC/FIMS.

Fuel JP-7 RP-1 RG-1 Jet A Jet A-1 JP-5
3327 96-3219 95-3136 NAPC22
n-paraffins, 8.8 2.1 0.3 8.4 10.3 7.0
wt%
i-paraffins 29.1 27.1 8.1 20.8 27.4 21.2
naphthenes 59.8 62.4 86.3 39.6 26.9 50.9
aromatics 2.3 8.4 5.3 31.2 35.4 20.9

ASTM D1319 1.1 2.3 2.9 18

aromatics,
vol%
Aromatics 4.0 3.1
[Mehta et al
1995], vol %
Spec max, 5 5 20* 20* 25
vol%
*25 vol% if seller notifies user

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American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
 Table 5. RP-1 composition by GC-FIMS
1-ring 2-ring 3-ring Benzo- Benzo-
Isoparaffins n-Paraffins cycloparaffins cycloparaffins cycloparaffins Alkylbenzenes cycloalkanes dicycloalkanes Naphthalenes
c7 0.000 0.000 0.004 0.000 0.000 0.021 0.000 0.000 0.000
c8 0.000 0.011 0.030 0.002 0.002 0.350 0.000 0.000 0.000
c9 0.044 0.063 0.697 0.135 0.013 1.149 0.009 0.000 0.000
c10 0.590 0.244 4.154 2.372 0.113 1.848 0.132 0.000 0.003
c11 4.810 0.817 11.525 7.590 0.607 1.807 0.372 0.005 0.327
c12 8.058 0.687 10.637 6.514 1.167 1.205 0.496 0.014 0.041
c13 7.902 0.052 5.855 3.427 1.117 0.372 0.180 0.006 0.011
c14 4.465 0.136 2.580 1.585 0.608 0.048 0.018 0.000 0.000
c15 1.099 0.039 0.736 0.651 0.150 0.005 0.003 0.000 0.000
c16 0.158 0.016 0.056 0.041 0.002 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000
sum 27.127 2.064 36.274 22.316 3.778 6.806 1.210 0.025 0.384

Table 6. RG-1 composition by GC-FIMS

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1-ring 2-ring 3-ring 5-ring Benzo- Benzo- Naphtho-

Isoparaffins n-Paraffins cycloparaffins cycloparaffins cycloparaffins Alkylbenzenes cycloparaffins cycloalkanes dicycloalkanes cycloalkanes
c7 0.009 0 0.034 0 0 0.019 0 0 0 0
c8 0.032 0.003 0.151 0.008 0 0.039 0 0 0 0
c9 0.025 0.002 0.767 0.413 0.014 0.164 0 0.004 0 0
c10 0.166 0.022 2.447 2.428 0.077 0.324 0 0.091 0 0
c11 0.541 0.077 5.258 10.411 0.406 0.62 0 0.288 0.001 0
c12 1.191 0.075 6.727 12.534 1.188 0.609 0 0.61 0.007 0.004
c13 1.515 0.004 5.168 9.345 2.161 0.579 0 0.713 0.035 0.006
c14 2.349 0.058 4.313 6.441 2.739 0.44 0.009 0.412 0.025 0.002
c15 1.696 0.026 2.979 4.741 2.004 0.192 0.002 0.113 0.008 0.001
c16 0.592 0 1.261 1.514 0.55 0.017 0 0.011 0.002 0
c17 0 0 0.091 0.073 0.007 0.001 0 0 0 0
sum 8.116 0.267 29.207 47.914 9.147 3.003 0.011 2.241 0.078 0.014

Table 7. Typical fuel compositions. JP-7 composition uncertain (see text above).

Property JP-5 JP-7 JP-8 (Jet A/A-1) RP-1

Approx. Formula C12H23 C12H25 C11H21 C12H24
H/C ratio 1.92 2.07 1.91 1.98
Avg Composition
Aromatics, vol% 19 3 18 3
Naphthenes 34 42 35 58
Paraffins 45 55 45 39
Olefins 2 2
Sulfur, ppm 470 60 490 20

SURROGATES the primary aromatic component in kerosene aviation

fuels are alkyl benzenes. The distribution of alkyl
For modeling or experimental purposes, it is benzenes in two Jet A/Jet A-1 fuels [GC-FIMS] is
often useful to approximate the behavior of kerosene shown in Figure 4, centering roughly around C10.
fuels using “surrogate” mixtures of 10 or less Lindstedt and Maurice [2001] looked at benzene,
hydrocarbons [Edwards and Maurice, 2001; Wood, toluene, and ethylbenzene as aromatic components of a
1989; Wood et al, 1989]. For soot modeling, it is 89% n-decane/11% aromatic surrogate model for
thought that the surrogate must include an aromatic kerosene combustion. Good agreement was found with
component. GC-FIMS and Table 1 data indicate that species profiles in a burner-stabilized kerosene flame.
These analyses of aviation kerosenes indicates that a

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American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
 modeling surrogate would match real aviation fuels
more accurately if (1) the fraction of aromatics was
increased to about 18 vol%, (2) the aromatic was a C10
alkyl benzene, and (3) the non-aromatic component was
an iso-paraffin and/or naphthene, as opposed to a n-
paraffin. A recent kinetic modeling effort for JP-8 used
butyl benzene as the aromatic component, consistent
with the data shown in Figure 4 [Montgomery et al,
7
6
5
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Weight %
0
c7 c8 c9 c10
Carbon number
Figure 4. Alkyl benzene distribution from GC-FIMS.
HEAT OF FORMATION
Unlike pure compounds, the heat of formation
of petroleum distillates is not well-defined. For
example, the heat of formation is usually given in
kcal/mole; what is a mole of “kerosene”? If one
requires the heat of formation (for an Isp calculation,
for example), usually the heat of formation has to be
back-calculated from the heat of combustion and the
fuel H/C ratio. If the heat of formation is required per
mole, one must be careful to define what the reference
“mole” is. Often, the kerosene fuels are defined as (for
example) C12H24 or CH.1.9. Table 8 provides the heat of
formation (in mass units) for kerosene fuels as
calculated from the following equations:
Stoichiometry [molar basis] for complete
combustion:
CaHb + (a+ (b/4)) O2 Æ a CO2 + (b/2) H2O
Eq 1
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
2002]. Whether these changes would improve the
accuracy of the model prediction for aviation kerosene
combustion is certainly debatable given the scarcity of
experimental data. Surrogates for specialty kerosenes
like JP-7, RP-1, and RG-1 should be based primarily on
C11-C12 naphthenes and isoparaffins to match the real
fuels as closely as possible.
Jet A 3219
Jet A-1 3136
alkyl benzenes
c11 c12 c13 c14 c15 c16
Heat of combustion calculation (lower
value) (∆Hc ):
a(∆Hf CO2) + (b/2)(∆Hf H2O (gas)) - (∆Hf
fuel) – (a+(b/4))(∆Hf O2) = Heat of
combustion, in (typically) kcal/mole fuel,
∆Hc Eq 2
where ∆Hf = molar heat of formation {CO2=-94.05
kcal/mole, H2O (gas)=-57.80 kcal/mol, O2=zero
(definition)}. The only unknown in Equation 2 is the
heat of formation of the fuel. The molar heat of
formation can be obtained using the overall formulas
from Table 5, or using another user-defined “mole”.
Table 8 includes two values of hydrogen content for JP-
8, to show the sensitivity of heat of formation to
hydrogen content. The higher value of hydrogen
content is consistent with the most recent JP-8 data
(13.81% in 1999 and 2000). The data in Table 8 was
iterated with Mike Zehe of NASA/GRC to compare to
8
 existing kerosene fuel data in the NASA CEA code
[McBride and Gordon, 1996].
If one is interested in the variation in heat of
formation from lot-to-lot, say for the variable JP-8, the
DESC database could be used to calculate heat of
formation for each batch of fuel delivered, using the
batch-specific heat of combustion and H/C ratio. Don
Penn of AFRL/PRSE did such a calculation several
years ago using 1997 data, with the result shown in
Figure 5. Note that fuels such as JP-7 and RP-1 are
much less variable than JP-8 (Jet A/Jet A-1).

Table 8. Calculated heat of formation for kerosene fuels

Fuel wt% H H/C molar Mass heat of Mass Mass Heat of
(meas) (calc) comb, MJ/kg heat of heat of formation
(meas) comb., comb, (calc),
BTU/lb kcal/g cal/g
JP-4 14.300 1.9883 43.500 -10397 -413.94
JP-5 13.560 1.8693 43.100 -10301 -355.31
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JP-7 14.490 2.0192 43.500 -10397 -453.54

JP-8 13.850 1.9157 43.200 -10325 -391.86
JP-8 13.670 1.8869 43.200 -10325 -354.34
JP-10 1.6000 42.101 18100 -10062 -235.23
RP-1 1.9500 43.357 18640 -10362 -398.83

H eat of Form ation of JP-8,1997 Buys

140.0

120.0

100.0
JP-8, M Ga

80.0

60.0

40.0

20.0

0.0
5

5
2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

0.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.
HF
-3

-3

-3

-3

-3

-3

-3

-3

-4

-4

-4

-4

-4

-4

H eatofForm ation,kcal/100g

Figure 5. Batch-to-batch variation in calculated heat of formation.

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 SUMMARY
Almost 200 million gallons of kerosene
aviation fuels are burned each day world-wide. This
paper has summarized the characteristics and
composition of these fuels to a limited extent, and has
discussed some of the simplifications that are used to
approximate these fuels for various purposes.
REFERENCES
Bacha, J., Barnes, F., Franklin, M., Gibbs, L.,
Hemighaus, G., Hogue, N., Lesnini, D., Lind, J.,
Maybury, J., Morris, J., “Aviation Fuels Technical
Review,” Chevron Products Company,, 2000.
Bergsten, B., “Concise History of Aviation Fuel
Development in the United States,” unpublished,
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